The Secret of the Stone
by BiteMarks
Summary: In the dark days of Mick's despair he receives a mysterious visitor who gives him a precious gift and propels him toward his destiny.


**The Secret of the Stone**

Mick poured himself a drink and sat down behind his desk. Yesterday it was a cheating husband, the day before that a son defrauding the family business. Today who knew what new depths of human corruption and deceit he'd have the dubious pleasure of wading through. His fingertips glided around the cool, smooth curve of the glass tumbler in his hand – so different in texture from the malleable warmth of the girl last night - and he raised it to the windows behind him in a mocking salute to the sunset. Liquid breakfast - not the one his vampire _mama_ had recommended so long ago - but one he could take, or leave, at his own damn discretion.

He closed his eyes, struck for a moment by the memory of last night's meal, a rivulet of blood rolling gently downward from the wound and across a creamy swell of breast. He took another swig of whisky, needing the burn at the back of his throat to blot the image out. So he'd started sleeping with the girls as well as feeding from them - what was one more broken vow amongst the multitude of oaths he'd already abandoned?

The sky outside darkened. Today was his anniversary. He smiled with grim humour. Anniversaries suggested a wedding or a death – or in his case, both. Lucky him, getting double the bang for his buck that day the way he had. Sometimes he didn't know why he bothered going on. He raised the glass to his lips again and then raised an eyebrow. It used to bother him, finding an empty glass in his hand and not quite knowing when he'd finished it. These days he just poured another. He reached a hand out for the bottle.

Mick's eyes widened. A whiff of something _old_ came from behind him and he swung his chair around, half out of his seat, palms flat on the surface of his desk before he got himself in check, sat himself back down again.

A vampire was sitting chair opposite, his telltale scent a not unpleasant reminder of the earthy aroma of the old French wine cellars he and his comrades-in-arms had taken shelter in at times during the war. The visitor's cheeks were gaunt, a neatly trimmed goatee on his chin. His hair was greying at the temples. That was curious enough in a vampire - humans were usually turned when young and desirable - but it was his expression that held Mick's attention. The fellow carried himself with the silent dignity of a monarch, his body absolutely still, his hands folded over the head of a polished black cane balanced between his feet. Mick noted the ornate platinum ring on his forefinger, wondering whether his visitor might indeed be some sort of European vampire royalty.

"I mean you no harm," the old vampire said.

It was true. No scent of malice tainted the office air. Mick relaxed back into his chair and gestured for the man to continue.

"In a very short while a woman will come to your office door requesting your assistance with the retrieval of her daughter. She will be quite distraught. The girl is her only child. The woman will offer to compensate you but tell you she doesn't have resources enough to offer payment upfront." The man reached into his jacket and tossed a thick wad of notes onto Mick's desk. "Half your payment in advance. You're to reassure the woman that you will take the case anyway and return to her what was unlawfully taken."

Mick regarded the fellow evenly. He'd worked several missing persons cases in the past, had some success with them, too. Finding a lost child wouldn't be too difficult, but something didn't smell right. He didn't like the vampire connection to this case. He'd heard rumours, myths about vampire sects that drank only from the bodies of children. He thanked whatever deity may exist that he hadn't yet sunk low enough to be ready to deliver a child into the hands of a cult like that, no matter how much money he was paid.

"What's your interest in the matter?"

The man waited, his steady black eyes taking Mick's measure. "The girl is my granddaughter," he said eventually.

Mick raised his eyebrow but said nothing. Vampires turned in later life as this fellow so obviously had been, were often fortunate enough to have the remnants of their human DNA linger on in a human family tree. But this vampire… at a guess, his grand daughter had gone to her rest some time before Columbus discovered the continent.

"You're right," the man said, as if reading his mind. "She is a very distant branch of my bloodline, but she is family… and she is the last."

Mick could hear the hollow rustling of the wind in the trees as if he was there again, watching from the shadows as his sister's coffin was lowered into the ground. It had been the single most desolate day of his sorry existence. He raised his chin and looked back at the man. Vampires didn't talk about it, but none of them forgot the yawning sense of abandonment that engulfed them when they lost the last link to their human lives.

"I'll take the job." Hell, a kid was in danger, was there ever any doubt? There was just one more thing. "What's the catch?"

The old vampire raised a puzzled eyebrow.

"The local police can do just as good a job on this as I can, maybe better, given that a child's involved. Public opinion means plenty of resources."

"This task requires a… _specialist_."

That meant it required someone with vampire speed and strength.

"Another vampire is involved?"

"One of the most dangerous."

Mick sat up straighter. "Tell me."

"I can't give you any more information," the old vampire said with a shrug, "than you already have."

Mick frowned, mystified. It looked like that was all he was going to get. The older vampire rose from the seat and headed toward the door then stopped as if he'd thought better of leaving and turned, tugging the ring from his finger and tossing it onto Mick's desk.

"This child is important to me. Take this and wear it as a reminder of that. You will return it to me and receive the other half of your fee when the job is done."

It happened just as the old vampire had said, the knock at his door, the woman falling into his arms weeping, pressing a photograph of her little girl into his hands with pleading eyes. It hadn't taken him long to track down Coraline. He'd recognised her scent the moment he stepped into the crime scene. He couldn't believe her craziness. She wanted them to have a vampire family. Maybe it was the irony of that word that drove him to it, the fact that he could never have one, or maybe it was just the child's terror, helpless to avoid the fate that had befallen him. The travesty of the awful parallel enraged him.

When it was done he took the child home and the girl's mother reached out and lifted her from his arms. The little girl had only lain there for a moment, but it felt like a plug had been pulled from his socket, the power to put one foot in front of the other suddenly gone. To make it worse, Mrs Turner gripped his arm in gratitude and thanked him - what a _kind_ man, what a _good_ man he was. He waved her away, sickened by the incongruity of the words, and stumbled back to the Merc, waiting until the Turner's front door had closed before resting a hand on the passenger-side door of his car and leaning over into the gutter and retching.

*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*

.

Mick looked out at the city lights with unseeing eyes and tossed back a shot. He was reaching for a second when he stiffened. He didn't bother turning around.

"Keep your money," he said.

He heard the man settle into a chair, the sound of a wad of cash drop onto his desk. "You must be paid what you've earned, my young friend."

Mick swung his chair around. "If I was human, I'd have earned life in a six by ten cell."

"Ahh," the man said, "so you decided to end her." He glanced at the drink in Mick's hand and nodded sagely. "One more reason for you to sink into the abyss."

Mick frowned furiously. "What do you know about my life?," he said bitterly, tugging the old man's ring from his finger and clenching it in his fist. "About suffering, about hating what you are?"

The older vampire raised a hand. "I was not always as I am, and like you, I did not welcome my transformation."

Mick frowned warily. When it seemed that younger vampire would listen, the old man spoke again.

"A long time ago in a place far from here, I was the very last leader of a noble religious order devoted to chivalry and peace-keeping amongst mighty nations. Our brotherhood attracted the brightest scholar-warriors of each generation and we became powerful, learned, an order to be feared. Tales of a hidden treasure began to circulate amongst the great circles we moved within. In envy our king ordered our treasure to be seized and the destruction of our order. The men who came to arrest me weren't men at all, but demons," the older man looked at Mick meaningfully, "creatures who needed to suck the lifeblood of their human hosts in order to survive. Our order had hunted these pathetic creatures along the byways frequented by pilgrims for centuries. In our hubris, we never suspected that one day they might be in positions of power. Too late for me did it become apparent that not only had they risen in the world, but that they knew of the order's treasure and sought it for themselves." He leaned forward, his clever black eyes gleaming keenly in Mick's direction. "Yes, indeed there was a treasure, only it didn't consist of gold or jewels. My own field of research was the natural world. I had spent my latter years in the search for a serum that would prolong the course of one's life, allow the good to live on, to prosper and to provide wise governance to their fellow man. I created such a serum in the final year of my life."

"The fountain of youth," Mick breathed.

The old vampire shrugged. "It has been called many things."

"But -," Mick said.

"Why should the demons want it, indeed?" the man replied with a smile. "Immortality was already theirs." He leaned forward. "The serum was a lethal toxin to their kind. One sip, one tiny smudge rubbed into a cut or wound was enough to end their deadly existence forever. They could not afford for such a concoction to fall into the hands of any but themselves, for humankind would surely use it to wipe them out of existence.

"I was tortured of course. When I did not speak, they arrested my common-law wife and family. My wife, they drained in front of me. My daughter was not so lucky. After they had finished abusing her she was sold into slavery. My son was tortured and half blinded by the beatings. He never regained full sight. When still I did not reveal the serum's whereabouts, they threatened to turn me into such as they." The older vampire shuddered. "I prayed for deliverance. I had no desire to become a monster and I cursed God for abandoning me to this fate." He shook his head sadly, "When they had finished with me the thirst was terrible and on the fourth day, they placed my injured son into the dungeon with me." The older vampire bowed his head, and when he went on his voice was steely. "Despite my privations, I was able to cease feeding just before his heart beat its last, but I was weak. I could not bear the thought of being the cause of my only son's death, so I ripped the vein from my wrist and held it to his lips." He smiled bitterly at Mick. "Now, I was doubly damned. The following day I went to my execution - tied to a stake and immolated at noon. All of my order followed, hunted to extinction."

Mick frowned. Neither human nor vampire was immune to naked flame.

The man smiled. "I had tasted of my own serum of course. Not even I had suspected its regenerative powers. I will not speak of the many years after that in which I despaired or of the evil deeds I undertook, only that when I had learned to curb the worst of the demon's excesses, I tracked down my poor abused daughter. I have watched over her children and her children's children since that time and in time I finally saw the meaning of God's plan for me." He looked meaningfully at Mick's open palm where the heavy white gold ring now lay. "The sigil of my new Order."

Mick looked down at the ring on his palm. Atop the heavily decorated thick white-gold band, a diamond-studded cross arched over a glowing white stone that was cupped within the ring's interior.

"The diamonds signify our immortality, the Holy Cross our oath to protect the pure soul of humanity - the shining stone within."

Mick was quiet, thoughtful. "And the inscription?" he said, tilting the ring so that light gleamed from the spidery engraving on the ring's inner surface.

"Ah, you have an eye for detail," the old vampire smiled approvingly. "_Pax in Virtute_, our motto. Peace through Virtue," he said. "Although such as we are damned and cannot enter the gates of Heaven, we can attain some measure of serenity here by our good deeds."

Mick held the ring out toward him as if suddenly reluctant to part with it. The older vampire reached out both hands and curled Mick's fingers around the heavy white gold band.

"For my granddaughter's life I grant you a gift," he said. "Keep it, as a sign that a path other than the one to hell is open to you should you wish it." He looked thoughtful for a moment and then said, "The ring itself is quite valuable, but your true gift lies beneath the cross, my son."

Mick's slid the ring onto his forefinger, listening intently.

"I give to you the gift of death."

Mick's eyebrow rose and he examined the glowing white stone nestled in the ring's interior more closely.

"Should you ever weary of the endless nights, only crush the stone within the ring and mix it with a little blood and drink it. You will be delivered from damnation before the dawn of the following day."

Mick looked astonished. "This is the serum? Your serum?"

The old vampire smiled. "A portion of the fabled treasure of the Templars lays crystallized on your finger at this very moment."

Mick looked thoughtful. "If I do as you say... I'll die?"

"Most assuredly," the old vampire nodded. He stood up and extended his hand to Mick. "But I hope you do not use it. You're a demon but you can still do good. It is a worthy way to spend eternity, my son."

Mick watched the door close behind the older vampire. Torture, Templars, a secret brotherhood of vampire protectors? He needed a drink. His hand snaked out toward the bottle of whiskey on his desk and as it did, light gleamed from the curved band of the white gold ring on his forefinger. He hesitated. Then his hand curled firmly around the neck of the bottle and he pulled out the bottom drawer of his desk and placed the bottle inside and nudged it closed.

*.*.*.*.*

.

The old vampire took the elevator down to the basement car park and stepped into a long black limousine. It glided out up the ramp and out onto the road and to the scene of the still smoking remains of what was once a warehouse. A dark figure stepped out of the shadows and into the waiting car. The old man didn't turn his head, remaining seated with his hands upon the shiny black cane before him.

"The child is well? She didn't suffer any harm?"

"No," the woman said, "but - ."

"You did well, daughter."

"Sire," the woman cried out, "I don't understand why you had me take the child. It has turned him against me. He left me to the fire. Oh Grandpere, he no longer loves me."

The old vampire's face hardened. "Penance for the sin of taking him against his will, Child." He sighed, then softened, chucking her under the chin. "You might one day be redeemed of all your sins, daughter. I've watched this husband of yours. He has the calling - he only needed the clarion to be loud enough for him to hear." The old vampire looked off into the distance. "Despite the despondency he has descended into, his heart is pure. I have accepted him into our order and believe that one day he may become the most virtuous of our champions."

"You gave him one of the rings?"

"I did."

The woman's blackened face seemed stricken. "You told him its secret? The secret of the stone?" She could tell by her sire's face that he had. "Oh, Grandpere," she lamented, "He hates what he is. He'll take the serum and be lost to us, to _me_, forever."

"I told him only that the potion of the stone would deliver him from the weariness of his demonic existence, and it will. It is indeed as fatal as I promised, but death will come to him gradually as a result of long and well-lived human life. If he does long for humanity, as you say, he will be blessed with it at the time he feels most despairing of its loss. Better reparation for your sin I could not have granted him. Until then, he has been given the opportunity to right the wrongs he has done to his human brothers." The old man put a hand over the charred hand of his granddaughter. "This time, his fate will be in his own hands."

The limousine purred to life and carried Coraline and her sire, the Grand Master of the Inferus Coeli, all of the vampires under heaven dedicated to protecting their human brethren, away with it.

.

*.*.*.*.*


End file.
